a few good men 7 to start with. >> there was 110 selected by the air force and navy. it whittled down to 32 after the interviews. 32 of us went to the clinic and i was the only guy to fly. oo i i had a high belly reuben which was a pigment in your blood. based on that they said well you are out. >> at the time your little boy was into dinosaurs and rockettes. you were not into dinosaurs. >> when i didn't get into the mercury program i was interested in rockettes before the guys could spell. >> project mercury began in 1958 with the goal to put a human in orbit and doing so before the soviets could. on the second count they failed. 3 and a half years after the sputnik shock on april 12th, 1961, the soviets out paced the u.s. once again when confidante became the first human being in space. >> they beat us into orbit. so we were behind. we were lagging. >> america scrambled to catch up. less than one month later mercury 7 became the first american in space. just over 3 nonts into his presidency john f. kennedy like millions of other americans across the country was glue